COMIC ART PROPAGANDA Following three images courtesy of St. Martin’s Press.

If one art form has the power to seduce, shame or otherwise influence us into behaving a certain way, what does that say about art in general? In Comic Art Propaganda, author Fredrik Strömberg surveys almost a century’s worth of attempts to use comics as a method of instructing and inculcating various populations. Stromberg’s totally neutral tone will likely humble readers of all stripes at some point, as patriotic themes (such as the character Captain America) are balanced with comic books romanticizing comrade Che as a young Ernestino.

Comic Artist Al Hartley, best known for “The Archies,” produced a series of Christian conversion biography comics, this one of Maria Anne “Hansi” Hirschmann, who gave her life to Christ after having been an admirer of the Third Reich in her youth.

Name a polemic of the last century and it will have its own advocacy, if not on the editorial pages of newspapers then quite likely in their funny pages. While it is easy to spot the anti-drug propaganda in comics stretching back to the 1960s, the author dryly looks at counterculture underground comic icons such as the Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers as pro-drug propaganda. Comics were used to mock and defame the Nazis to young American audiences and to extol their virtues to the Hitler Youth.

Zealous proselytizing is guaranteed in one of many Chick Tracts, published since 1970.

The book covers Sex, Drugs, Race, Politics, War and Religion. Strömberg’s historic overviews of each subject and encyclopedic knowledge make for a breezy, informative read, but the shrunken comic panels throughout are frustrating. The author makes up for it with a mountain of compelling historic trivia: Are you familiar with those bible-thumping rectangular comics (called Chick Tracts after Christian cartoonist Jack T. Chick) striking fear into the hearts of those not accepting Christ? Over half a billion Chick Tracts have been sold in their four-decade publishing history, but they have been banned as hate literature in Canada. In this definitive overview, the author deftly shows that a blunt, biased message can be softened and more easily delivered in animated form.

A page from an anti-drug 1971 GREEN LANTERN comic

Is the potency of overt manipulation of the viewer inherent in comics? If so, what is the message of art based on comics that is not propaganda? One could look to the latest in “LowBrow” art to ponder that question. LowBrow art is the umbrella term for artists working in the accessible pictorial space where comic books’ pretense to pop art confuses surrealism as the path to an All American careerism if not downright rock stardom.

WEIRDO NOIR All Images Below courtesy CHRONICLE BOOKS.

Weirdo Noir, is the sequel to Weirdo Deluxe, an encyclopedic tome of alternative art by author Matt Dukes Jordan. Subtitled “Gothic and Dark Lowbrow Art,” the tome casts a wide net in search of scary illustrations rendered interesting by a cross-section of emerging and established LowBrow artists. The inclusion of a wide swath of artistic approaches expands the definition of “gothic” to include kitschy paintings of the Munsters as well as more abject presentations that might challenge the squeamish, always with the lowbrow trademarks of hot chicks and cartoon surreality.

Artist:ALEX GROSS, Departure (2001)

Instead of casting a curatorial or critical eye at what might constitute “dark and gothic,” Jordan presents Lowbrow’s eerie side as a “genre within a genre,” delivering a catalog of the emerging and established names in Lowbrow who have been producing work in a “gothic” vein. The book has a set structure, asking each artist the same series of questions and while very little of note gets discussed, the pictures are the thing and there are hundreds of them here. The highlight of the book is Jordan’s reworking of a millennia-plus timeline to chronicle the ebb and flow of noirish themes through Jordan’s “Dark Art History.”

Artist:ISABEL SAMARAS, Venus (Morticia) (2002)

I could list my favorites or bash some inclusions of less than worthy LowBrow artists, but the LowBrow movement is the subtlest and surest propaganda for mercantilism that has ever teamed with art. Yes, capitalism’s ugly lovable cousin, mercantilism triumphs in LowBrow, where every artist has a signature style that is established and then mined for as much product as possible. Critiquing much of this art is like rationalizing why one purchases a rectangular bottle of purple shampoo instead of oval tube of aquamarine hair cleanser. Jordan takes his subjects seriously and the fact that Noir is a rich subcategory within LowBrow bodes well for a few more sequels ahead in this series, unwitting propaganda of self-employment for those who can master a signature style.

Artist:TRAVIS LOUIE, Sad Mr. Grimace (2008)

(Full Disclosure: I have edited and published a few essays over the years by Matt Dukes Jordan in my magazine, Coagula. But his publisher sent me a review copy independent of his efforts – in fact, Matt was shocked to hear the book had been printed and drove down to my place to see my copy a full month before he got his hands on his very own.)

This government agency and that government agency all rolled over for billionaire Eli Broad to build his museum at the 200 block of South Grand Avenue in Downtown L.A. The aging civic booster will pay the construction costs and relocate his Broad Art Foundation there from Santa Monica, but you and I can agree on what to call it and take ownership of this institution by controlling the language! Hey, Starbucks calls a chocolate malt a “Moca Frapuccino”, we can call the old man’s museum whatever we want.

Beyond a refusal to acquiesce public space to one man’s name no matter the content of his his wallet, the real problem with calling the Broad “The Broad” is the dude’s name to begin with. This certain-to-be-sterile institution will have nothing in common with a swaggering old broad. Nope, Eli the dullard capitalist is the furthest thing from a saucy broad in looks, taste and vitality. But regardless of the impotency of his wallet-free persona, his museum must be given an acronym with pizazz and marketing potential. So here are ten possible acronyms for Mr. Broad’s new museum, each with their own mission statement.

BAM – Broad Art Museum

The easiest acronym may be problematic with lousy cellphone reception:

HER: I’m at the BAM

HIM: Where is there a Dam in LA?

HER: BAM!

HIM: Well damn you too! (hangs up)

And pray there is never a shooting on Grand Avenue

OFFICER: What happened when he pulled out the gun?

WITNESS: It was like BAM!

OFFICER: I thought you said this happened at MOCA, I think we’re going to need to take you in for more questioning.

So if none if you want to spend the night in jail on the receiving end of good-cop bad-cop, pick one of the nine remaining acronyms…

ABC – Art of the Broad Collection

If network television does not have much longer to go, Eli’s ego can allow him to defeat Channel 7 and take on the alphabet itself for significance.

BACO – Broad Art Collection

If the museum is just artificially maintaining the price tag of Eli’s art holdings, you can bet that his boring blue-chip art collection will be the constant center or our shortening attention spans.

The EEL – short for Edythe and ELi

Marketing the overpriced collection with a hip moniker that sends props to Broad’s wife Edythe for buying matching drapes all these years. Many a good headline awaits:

•Dan Flavin looks Electric at the EEL

•Barbara Kruger EEL Survey Lacks Spark

•”Nam June Paik Electrocutes Art History at the EEL”

BAM BAM – Broad Artist Management at the Broad Art Museum

Perhaps Eli intends to become the art world equivalent of CAA and manage the careers of the artists he collects. Why not have the agency housed in the same building as the art?

DOGMA – Downtown On Grand Museum of Art

If the museum is meant to prop up Eli’s real estate holdings downtown and his vision for Grand Avenue (whatever they may be, I have a hunch he is not a renter), why not put the location into the name – it will help all those westsiders punch the name into their GPS for a rare foray east of Highland. And this museum may end up so boring you will really need to believe the dogma of postmodernism to make the move.

BROMIDE – Broad Museum In Downtown Everyday

Nothing upsets a museum visitor more than showing up when the galleries are between exhibitions. A “7-Days-A-Week” policy could be a marketing bonanza for Eli. It will assure his building the lion’s share of anyone needing a Jeff Koons fix on the day LACMA is hosing down their balloon dog.

POVERA – Palace Of Visual Entertainment and Return on investment Art

If Eli buys it, you can bet that it looks good in his portfolio next to the business investments. But so little blue chip art is meaningful beyond the core art audience, so why not emulate the Arte Povera movement and scatter about the Visual Entertainment of interesting Los Angeles contemporary art amidst the bankable Damien Hirst and Cindy Sherman hedge fund decorations.

EAMES – Eli’s Art Museum of Elite Snobbery

Well, there would be no doubt of what kind of furniture Broad would put in his cathedral to honor feeling superior. The hippest seating of the 20th century would abound at a place that aims to make the ordinary museum visitor feel small and insignificant amidst all the price tags.

By popular demand, I have been asked to say a few nice things about some great artists who deserve attention. I am most happy to oblige.

Here is my list of ten famous Los Angeles artists who, despite their success, continue to be underrated wherever contemporary art happens. They have each had their share of accolades, moments in the sun, additions to the permanent collection of international museums and received prestigious grants. Fame and fortune have not eluded most of these artists, but I insist that the fates smile more broadly in their direction and am certain that history shall.

But for now, their names are included on rosters of many artists, lumped in with a hundred less deserving success stories. The mention of any of them can still draw a blank stare from art aficionados often enough to remind me that no matter how high up the mountain of success these great talents have climbed, your humble critic here must do his part to push them each a step or two higher up that incline on their way to immortal art superstardom.

Basically, you have to be rated first to then be underrated, so this Los Angeles List is not a check off of: hot new artists or trendsetters (if it were it would include Jaime “Germs” Zacarias and Mark Allen), masters of craft and pictorial poetry (which would be led by Martha Alf and Lisa Adams), nor of overlooked gems (I’d much rather write 1,500+ words on Ben Sakoguchi and the legendary Chaz Bojorquez).

The following list is of the artists that you see in the LA Art World at high levels and quite often, but that, in my humble and well-honed opinion, you just don’t see often enough.

George Herms – Assemblage

George Herms courtesy Norton Simon Museum

In the mid 1970s a fire destroyed the Nick Wilder gallery. As George Herms tells it, he raced there to see if his work in the back room was damaged. Arriving at the rubble he saw Andy Warhol and Wilder standing with two burnt Herms assemblage sculptures on the sidewalk. “Oh George,” said Andy, “everything else was destroyed but I think your work looks even better now.” Because his art was so immediately and universally understood, it became ubiquitous in style without George Herms ever getting any credit for its development. And so he is still overlooked despite fifty years of exhibiting in Los Angeles at the top levels and locations in contemporary art history. You would think that being the missing link between the beats and the hippies might make Herms a cultural icon, but add to that his being the west coast bridge between assemblage and pop art, and there is no excuse for his anonymity. George Herms gets every party invite in the LA Art World, but it is unforgivable that the party is never for him.

In an art world that lauds the ambiguous object with praise, Uta Barth’s blurred visions of life seem intimately specific to each viewer. While confusion reigns in so much art today as an excuse for artists to avoid committing to a turf, Barth’s lens unites us all in the poetry of the unimportant moment. She has had great success and has exhibited all over the world so it might be easy to roll your eyes at another elegant Uta Barth masterpiece. But there is so much mediocre photography out there, so much wall space product either cynically mimicking the commercial end or critiquing content altogether. Meanwhile her compositions of the micro-moments that make up everyone’s life cannot be undersold in their greatness simply because they can be absorbed, appreciated and comprehended to thus be rightfully celebrated.

Llyn Foulkes – Painter

Llyn Foulkes courtesy Hammer Museum

He was expelled from LA’s historic Ferus Gallery for refusing to attend the openings of other artists. This cantankerous independence comes across in his confrontational paintings that are usually balanced with the poetic wistfulness of a true romantic. His recurring themes carry drama: the lost promise of America, the darker side of Disney and the desert landscape as a metaphor for the emptiness of one’s own struggles. But what sets Llyn Foulkes apart for the ages is an idiosyncratic approach to painting that includes collage, assemblage and brilliant rendering coalescing into an unrivaled 3-D illusionistic space. The stunning finished product drives home Foulkes’ poignant ruminations with even more severity and sincerity.

Eloy Torrez – Painter, Muralist

Eloy Torrez courtesy El Paso Museum of Art

Loved or hated for his 1985 mural of Anthony Quinn dancing as Zorba the Greek painted on Downtown LA’s Victor Clothing Company building, Eloy Torrez has exhibited at the museum level and has had numerous public commissions and grants. In addition to murals, he is one of the great portrait painters in Los Angeles. To see one of his major paintings up close in a gallery actually sharpens one’s ability to define good portraiture based on how closely it approximates a Torrez. But mention Eloy in art circles and people do a mock Zorba dance. Despite this entertaining cross to bear, collector Cheech Marin is appearing in a documentary about the artist, so Eloy may be the first to exit this list and arrive at the proper level of being rated commensurate with his talent.

Kim Dingle – Painter

Kim Dingle courtesy Brooklyn Museum

One of the great expressionist painters the region has ever produced, the imagery of Kim Dingle’s work may likely cause history to recall her as the visual art equivalent of Camille Paglia – a bold anti-victim feminist depicting women as independent forces of nature. Dingle made the Whitney Biennial a decade ago with paintings and installations featuring renderings of eight-year-old girls dressed for a Sunday tea service unleashed in violent naughtiness. My (perhaps jaded) thought during the first girl-on-girl knife fight in Tarantino’s Kill Bill was, “Dingle was doing this with oil paint fifteen years ago.” And when she is not pouring wine for diners at her restaurant Fatty’s in Eagle Rock, she is still doing it, and with a waiting list of collectors at Sperone Westwater Gallery in New York and Europe.

Perhaps the only contemporary artist who can shock with the best of them but back it up with his art better than any of them, Daniel J. Martinez gained infamy in the 1993 Whitney Biennial with admission tags that read, “I cannot imagine ever wanting to be white.” After the outrage had passed, though, the (white) clowns at the LA Times sure never went back to see what the birth of an international biennial superstar delivered. Martinez raised the bar with a lifelike self-portait animatronic sculpture that slit its wrists as a performance. He continues to carve new territory where the abject meets the political, but you’d never know the heights he has achieved and the ground he continues to break by reading his hometown paper.

It is inconceivable in the realm of logic that Claes Oldenburg has an international reputation for his monumental pop sculptures and Robert Therrien does not have similar name recognition. If being in the permanent collections of many world class museums and represented by the Gagosian Gallery here at home is enough, then Therrien can rest easy. But I cannot. The brilliance of his magnification of the mundane is how effortlessly it makes most other sculpture seem inarticulate and forgettable. A pile of plates, a card table and folding chairs, the most mundane aspects of our life are rendered monumental in Therrien’s precise enlargements. In an art world bent on celebrating the ephemeral and the inconsequential as worthy of attention, the shadow of Therrien’s permanence is cast with or without acknowledgement.

Gronk – Painter

Gronk courtesy Pacific Asia Museum

Because the nature of academia and institutions is to ignore beauty, the academics want to codify Gronk’s contribution to art as his membership in the four-artist 1970s collective “ASCO.” But Gronk went a long way on from ASCO to paint beautiful operatic abstractions as well as render his signature “Tormenta” character holding the theater curtain as she dramatically ponders her next move. Despite a mid-career LACMA retrospective of his art now a decade in the past, he still gets pushed into the historical pigeonhole of his mid-1970s radicalism. ASCO may have milked its fifteen minutes for all four members four times over, but Gronk’s brilliance as an individual free from the collective towers over his institutionally-approved rebellion.

Mary Corse – Painter

Mary Corse courtesy of Ace Gallery

The art world is dominated by minimalist egomaniacs claiming “historical importance” for mining niche visual and conceptual territory and calling it groundbreaking. In this battle of establishing the superiority of one’s signature style, Mary Corse has made paintings that resolve a multitude of pictorial conundrums. Her work answers questions that dogged painters for centuries? What is the role that light should play in a work? How shall a viewer become a participant without constructing anything more elaborate than stretched canvas? Corse delivers a minimal construct with maximum possibilities. By adding ground glass to paint, her large-scale paintings engulf the viewer in a halo, yet always reinforce the geometry and object-hood of their construction like the most rigorous Donald Judd pieces. Despite a stellar career landing in major survey shows and institutional collections, Mary Corse’s successful breakthroughs are only acknowledged on the periphery of greatness.

The blessing of being represented by the prestigious LA Louver Gallery is also a curse for some artists. Their 1970s-centric roster is as blue chip establishment investor grade art world as it gets. Artists there can be assured that the top collectors will be viewing their work, as a tireless staff and the credibility of a name brand gallery will see to it. And yet, playing second fiddle to David Hockney just seems so unfair for even the most successful artists in this Venice gallery’s stable. McMillen’s installations of ordinary life in great detail are in numerous institutional and big name collections and are the greatest crowd pleasers. His work is a true elevation of the historical art of painterly representation that will stand the test of time because none of his dioramas of any scale need any wordy explanation to be enjoyed. From top collectors to first-time museum visitors, McMillen’s art is accessible to everyone without pandering to any part of the strata.

IN CONCLUSION: IF you have an MFA in studio art from one of the local diploma mills- pardon me I mean prestigious schools of art, and you did not recognize all of these names, I will happily testify in your defense when you sue your institution for malpractice in your efforts to have your student loan debt erased. I suppose the only list left to do in this series is LA Art World Stars whose success is close to being the equivalent of their talent. You can tackle that list in the comments if you so choose.